I agree. Sometimes a group of good tasters will spend 10 minutes at a table discussing whether a wine is corked or not, what a waste of time. (Most people would just drink the wine and wonder why it didn’t taste as good as they expected.)
Happened to my wife just last night. She took a Rose’ to dinner with some friends, said it tasted “rotten apple-y” and not good, but the other two ladies happily drank it. Brought the bottle home, I poured a glass, and it was very obviously corked.
Something a little interesting to me: I left the glass out overnight, just as an experiment, and in the morning could not detect any TCA.
Wes,
Appreciate your comments. Obviously I am biased as I gave up on cork many years ago. It’s hard to believe that so many highly intelligent people use such inconsistent packaging for their fine products. And that’s what cork is - packaging. What other industry would put up with the inconsistency and failure rate of cork?
It is so nice to open bottle after bottle and have each one taste the same as the previous. (And, age well and consistently over a long period of time.)
Peter Rosback
Sineann (ITB)
I agree, there are positive advantages to screwcaps, not just the absence of problems. My Verdicchio producer (Fabio Marchionni from Colle Stefano) started using screwcaps for our shipment in 2012. I had dinner with him in April with another Verdicchio grower, and he brought bottles of the 2012 under both cork and stelvin; we all thought the stelvin showed better, and the cork bottle was neither corked nor oxidized.
The lack of consistency under cork is a huge problem, presumably due to both very widely varying oxygen transmission and low levels of TCA.
I have a low threshold for TCA. Maybe I am lucky but only two corked bottles so far this year out of about 100 examples.
I am a fan off screw caps and would like to see more used.
Devil’s Advocate POV:
The anti cork people seem to lump cork as all one item. Also, as if no progress has been made in corks in the last 20 years. From what I can gather, big gains have been made.
I agree with this from Adam Lee:
“This is but speculation on my part, but I think that to an extent alternative closures are already providing a valuable service, by forcing cork manufacturers to get their shit together and reduce somewhat the percentage of tainted closures. Having competition is good.”
There seem to be big variations in the TCA rate for different types of cork and perhaps suppliers. We use Amorim twin tops on our whites. We went almost 1000 bottles without a single corked one. These are our own wines that my wife and mother drink every day. We know what they are supposed to taste like. I know that they claim under .2%, but I should check what the current stat is. The solid corks they sell me they claim under 1.5%
While I am sure that it is true that the cork people mess with the stats to try to look good, it is also true that the other closure makers continue to trot out 20 year old studies. Also, what are the fail rates (excess 02, leaks, etc.) for the other closures? Any studies? It can’t be 0.
I am not claiming cork is perfect. I do think the downside is sometimes over stated, assuming the producer is making a good effort to get the cleanest corks they can.
PS. I already own a corker… ![[cheers.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/0/0ff9bfcdb0964982cd3240b6159868fbdf215b1a.gif "cheers"){kind=small}
My sensibility for TCA has increased over the last 25 years, and often I´m the first (or only) one at a tasting table who says CORKED …
We have a food chemist in our monthly round - and he has often(well, now and then) tested suspicious bottles (for free) … and always found my or anyones elses suspicions correct.
My experience reg. TCA infected bottles is around 7% overall over the last 10-15 years … with slightly higher in Bordeaux, and still higher in the late 80ies and 90ies - and definitely less after 2005 … and also less in the Rhone generally …
I do think that the number of TCA infected corks have decreased over the last 10 or so years due to the high number of (cheap) wines with screwcaps or other alternative closures … so the selection (and I hope also responisibiliy) of the cork producers seems to have increased. I also think (and hope) they are somehow afraid to loose almost the whole business …
I´m absolutely not happy with use of alternative closures for “Vins de garde” (wines to cellar) because I don´t think it ages as well (or at least not as predictable) as under cork.
For wines to drunk young: no problem and the best decision!
Well if we’re going to shift gears from TCA to long term aging it’s pretty clear that corks are not predictable. Will it last 10 years? Most will. 20 years? Already start seeing a fair amount of variability. 30 years? Lots of variability by now. Some may be attributable to varying storage conditions, but even with identical storage in my cellar I see some variability in ullage at 20-25 years.
Screw caps don’t have the track record of cork except for a few studies, so it’s hard to say. But in theory, and based on the few studies that are out there, they should be more predictable, not less predictable, than cork. And screw caps should be less susceptible to compromise based on temperatures (a good or bad thing depending on how extreme the swings). It’s also not clear what the ideal oxygen transmissibility is for long term agers, so that’s a remaining question. But screw caps seem to have a clear advantage over corks when it comes to predictability from one bottle to the next.
I did NOT mean the predictability between bottles, but the p. of the aging curve.
With a let´s say 2010 Burgundy under cork I have a fair idea how it might taste in 10, 15, 20 years from my cellar,
the same wine under screwcap … and I have no idea … the worst can be it tastes like 5 years old …
Gerhard,
There is now a range of different screwcaps with different oxygen transmission characteristics, which can be matched to the wine type. And the curve will be consistent, which isn’t true of cork.
Aha - and you can tell me
a) which producer uses which screwcap with which oxygen transmission characteristics ?
b) how a - let´s say - 1er Cru Burgundy, or a Chateauneuf-dP - of a certain vintage will age at different o.t.c. ?
c) how I can get a certain producer to use certain s.caps with certain o.t. characteristics ?
d) If all what you (or anybody else) now tells me is really true in 10, 15, 20 years … ?
![[scratch.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/4/42a16863a8714da3c1604419e3eb9206bb87aa50.gif "scratch"){kind=small}
Sorry, the best way IMHO is
a) to use as many screwcaps or alternatives as possible for the 98% of cheap wines …
and b) force the corks producers ( still more than now) to select their best material for the fine wines!
So far I buy screwed bottles only from one producer, who is a personal friend of mine …
Wouldn’t the worst be that the wine is TCA tainted or pre-moxed?
Adam Lee
Siduri Wines
When someone tells me how a producer can be sure that each and every cork they use is free of TCA, then I will stop advocating for alternative closures.
David,
I used to feel that way, but then I read more and more about the variance in oxygen ingress rates with traditional cork and that has become an increasingly problematic issue with me as well.
Adam Lee
Siduri Wines
Adam,
I can see where you would worry about it. I’m less worried about that than I am about TCA (cork) and reduction (screw cap).
+1
Anyone know the latest word on glass closures (Vino-Seal)? The '04 Sineann CF I opened last night was in great shape and the resealable glass cork is slick. I did a quick search and it seems that they are used more in Europe than here (cost or bottling line problems?).
I seem to run into fewer corked bottles than in years past, but I don’t know if that is from better quality control or increasing age screwing up my sense of smell and taste.
All I am saying is that there are now screwcaps that can give consistent oxygen transmission characteristics, at different levels of oxygen transmission. Cork is anything but consistent; one study a few years ago gave a 1000-fold variation in oxygen transmission in corks. If the absence of oxidation and TCA isn’t attractive to you, there we are. I would add that dogged consumer resistance to alternative closures is the reason many producers are worried about switching, quite apart from the technical aspect.
+2
Adam, Brian,
Totally with you. Of late I’ve been giving it a lot of thought and it is my inclination to favor the most consistent closure with the lowest oxygen ingress rate. Certainly a good argument could be made that many, many wines are made to be consumed quickly, so a closure that is predictable and favors early drinking would have much utility. My own inclination when I think about my wines is to use a closure that will preserve the wine for the longest time, thus allowing the longest drinking window - even if that drives the time of peak drinkability back.
Peter Rosback
Sineann (ITB)